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RESEARCH based (not experiment) Bio EE help!


allen2012

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So I decided to write a bio EE with the topic "biological roots of aggression". Not my wisest idea to choose biology AND a research based bio EE, I know, but it's too late for me to change it now unfortunately :dontgetit:  Anyway, I'm struggling with how I'm going to write this essay and some suggestions would be great help! Also, I am still not sure what my main research question should be. So far I have "To what extent should biological factors be held responsible for a crime of an individual?". I'm worried about it since I'm insecure on how I would actually try to answer this objectively! Also, my problem is how I should make the essay more focused and analytical. What I've written down in the essay so far are gene and brain abnormalities linked to aggression, put in some surveys, graphs and did some analysis on them. My supervisor also suggested that, to add some "computer based practical work" I find out the "origin" of the genes that are associated with violence using Blast.

 

I would really appreciate some tips from you all! :)

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Wellll I would say it's never too late to change your EE (they're not in until January time!) and also that your topic is sort-of sneaking into Psychology and then sashaying off into ethics. My strong advice would be to change topic to something more related to Biology and where you can conduct an experiment. Not to put a downer on your plans and so on, but if I were in your position, that's what I would do! If you read the EE Guide and look at their suggestions for Biology topics, that might give you a feel for what they're after.

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Wellll I would say it's never too late to change your EE (they're not in until January time!) and also that your topic is sort-of sneaking into Psychology and then sashaying off into ethics. My strong advice would be to change topic to something more related to Biology and where you can conduct an experiment. Not to put a downer on your plans and so on, but if I were in your position, that's what I would do! If you read the EE Guide and look at their suggestions for Biology topics, that might give you a feel for what they're after.

 

I emailed our EE advisor now and asked if I can still change. Still waiting for her reply and hopefully she says yes!!

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If I were you I would absolutely and undoubtedly change either your subject at which your current EE question is under or keep Biology as the EE subject and completely obliterate any remnants of your current topic. Whilst it will make for a great research paper, it will make for one of the worst, if not the worst Biology EE topics. A prerequisite to any Bio, or science EE for that matter is an experiment that should account for most of your EE. Essays that dont have any experiment included can expect to score in the lower brackets, possibly even fail.

Your predicament is intriguing in that you will have graphs from other sources but given that they have probably been analysed, rephrasing them will do you no good. My friend did an EE in chem and because an experiment was a minor part of his essay, he almost tried to embellish it, he got a weak C.

It is absolutely compulsory that you include an experiment in your EE and failure to do so will be at your detriment. Only a paltry amount of criteria revolve around research whilst the others mainly relate to your collection of data, analysis etc... so you should approach this as any other lab with its own idiosyncratic requirements.

I do not know how your EE will fair in psychology but I would assume it is more research based and so it is possible, even if you do not take psych as a subject. Again, a thing that is quite irksome to me is those who lie about when their exams take place since you should not even give the EE much thought if you are just about to enter the IBDP!

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  • 2 weeks later...

If I were you I would absolutely and undoubtedly change either your subject at which your current EE question is under or keep Biology as the EE subject and completely obliterate any remnants of your current topic. Whilst it will make for a great research paper, it will make for one of the worst, if not the worst Biology EE topics. A prerequisite to any Bio, or science EE for that matter is an experiment that should account for most of your EE. Essays that dont have any experiment included can expect to score in the lower brackets, possibly even fail.

Your predicament is intriguing in that you will have graphs from other sources but given that they have probably been analysed, rephrasing them will do you no good. My friend did an EE in chem and because an experiment was a minor part of his essay, he almost tried to embellish it, he got a weak C.

It is absolutely compulsory that you include an experiment in your EE and failure to do so will be at your detriment. Only a paltry amount of criteria revolve around research whilst the others mainly relate to your collection of data, analysis etc... so you should approach this as any other lab with its own idiosyncratic requirements.

I do not know how your EE will fair in psychology but I would assume it is more research based and so it is possible, even if you do not take psych as a subject. Again, a thing that is quite irksome to me is those who lie about when their exams take place since you should not even give the EE much thought if you are just about to enter the IBDP!

 

 

I asked our EE advisor about your suggestions which were if I could either change the subject and keep my topic or keep Biology and write about a completely new topic. She did not approve any of the two. :( Regarding experiment, what my supervisor advised for me to do was a "computer based experiment" which is using Blast to find out the origins of the genes that are associated to violent behavior.

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What the hell, it's your EE not your supervisor's EE. They don't have the right to 'authorise' or 'unauthorise' anything, just because they have some random hang up about it doesn't mean they have the right to ruin your grade by pretending to you that their approval is necessary. I would go totally crazy if somebody tried to pull that one over on me. All they have to do is sign a sheet of paper at the end saying it was your work and sign off how many hours they think you put into it/write a comment. They can do this regardless of what you do as your topic and telling you that they have some kind of 'approval' issue is a lie, there is nothing there for them to authorise and in the process of creating imaginary obstacles they're also screwing you over. Personally I would throw my weight around and let it be known that seeing as it's my EE, my grades and my future, it's also my decision as to what topic I do.

 

I'm not sure whether just looking up sequences on BLAST counts as an experiment and moreover I have no idea how you could use BLAST to elaborate on or answer your question. As far as I'm aware it just lets you look up lines of code, figure out introns and exons and then if you're lucky you can compare it to the same sequence for a fish or a mouse or some other creature they happen to have on there. Presumably you've figured this out somehow? The problems with your question remain the same, 1. that it's not really a Biology question and 2. that it's not an experimental topic. As for whether it's too broad or not, you've got to do your own research and find your own sources. When you know how much information is out there about the effect of brain structure on violent behaviour (for instance) then you'll know whether it's enough to fill 4,000 words and more - or not.

 

I still think you should stand your ground and just tell your EE supervisor that you're not going to be messed around, you're changing the topic, end of story. The topic is deeply flawed, and because of that it's hard to advise you about anything else without doing you a disservice.

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Again I dont know how to stress this enough but you will actually fail your EE if you keep your current question. That has to be one of the most absurd things I have ever heard and I really hope you contest such ludicrous declarations because it is your precarious diploma that will be periled.

This is one of those defiant situations in which you have to request either a change in supervisor, to a less stubborn one or really contrive an uproar and protest such stupid stipulations because, if you listen to anything ive told you, and actually looked at the rubric, you will find that most of the criteria have to do with your experiment itself.

Please do not allow a bereucracy stymie your ambitions as I faced a similar situation with prats in my school but you really have to maneuver them and realise that your destiny is in your hands.

At the end of the day you can be complacent with second class teaching and enjoy inflated grades and false hope but the IB wont give your complaints a second thought when you fail.

You are in quite the predicament and I must say I have never heard of such blasphemous assertions so I really do urge you to change either your subject, supervisor, topic... ANYTHING but do not continue on this path

Alternatively if you dont choose to, you can hope for a D/C and focus on TOK but you better hope that you pass TOK and get above 28points because in all likeness, a bio research paper sans experiment, will yield an E.

If you need help message me but for now this is all the advice I can render.

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